£3.6 MILLION COST OF OPERATION PALLIAL

OPERATION PALLIAL — the police investigation ordered by David Cameron into historic allegations of child abuse in North Wales — has cost £3.6 million so far.

The inquiry, carried out by the National Crime Agency on behalf of North Wales Police, is largely underwritten by the government.

The Home Office has paid 85 per cent of the cost — leaving the North Wales force with a bill of £550,000 up to March 2016.

A further £278,000 was spent by the National Crime Agency.

Rebecca obtained the figures from North Wales Police under the Freedom of Information Act.

Operation Pallial is still active and is forecast to cost a further £890,000 in 2016-17.

The final bill is likely to top £5 million.

This is in addition to the £3 million spent by the Macur Review of the 1996-2000 North Wales Child Abuse Tribunal.

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SO FAR eight men have been convicted and seven have gone to prison as a result of Operation Pallial.

One was gaoled for life and the others for a total of 43 years and 9 months.

They are:

John Ernest Allen

In 2014 John Allen, the former head of the private Bryn Alyn Community complex in Wrexham, was sentenced to life for sexually abusing 19 children in the 1970s and 1980s.

It was his second conviction — in 1995 he was gaoled for six years for abusing six residents of Bryn Alyn.

Allen is the most prolific child abuser in the North Wales scandal.

JOHN ALLEN CURRENTLY SERVING a life sentence handed down in 2014. In total, he abused 25 children in his care at the private Bryn Alyn Community. The complex of care homes around Wrexham was an immensely profitable business — local authorities in England and Wales paid him more than £30 million between 1974 and 1991 to look after problem children. Operation Pallial’s investigation into Allen’s activities continues.

Roger Griffiths

The former head of Gatewen Hall, part of the Bryn Alyn Community, was gaoled for 9 months in April this year.